Javed Abidi, the face of India’s disability rights movement, died of a chest infection on Sunday, reports Manash Pratim Gohain. The 53-year-old’s untiring advocacy led to disability being included as a separate category in the Census, India ratifying the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability in 2007 and a disability affairs department being set up.

Born in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh on June 11, 1965, Abidi was diagnosed with spina bifida, a birth defect in spinal cord. However, he was not operated upon in the first eight years, resulting in nerve damage. At the age of 10, he injured himself in a fall and underwent an operation. The family soon moved to the United States and Abidi received care at Boston Children’s Hospital and Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago. At the age of 15, he started using a wheelchair.

Despite physical difficulties, Abidi studied at Wright State University, and, in 1989, moved to India for a career in journalism.

Since 1990s, his organisation, DRG, has brought drastic changes in the way disabled people are treated in India. Abidi was instrumental in drafting the 1995 Disability Act and forcing inclusion of various disabilities like autism and dyslexia in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016. He was appointed the vice-chair of International Disability Alliance in 2013 and was currently the world chair of Disabled People’s International.

“We have lost the most prominent voice of our sector. We have lost an international leader as he was the sole voice of Global South. He pioneered the cross-disability movement in India and galvanised disability issues as developmental and human rights-based issues. An era ends with Javed-ji,” said Dr Satendra Singh, a disability rights activist.

Among Abidi’s several pathbreaking advocacy initiatives in India were inclusion of disability as a separate category in the Census, India’s ratification of Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability in 2007, and setting up of a separate disability affairs department.

Abidi believed that empowerment of persons with disabilities is linked to education, which, in turn, depends on accessibility. Both, he felt, were not possible without enabling laws and policies. In 2004, his letter to the Chief Justice of India on making polling booths accessible to disabled people was converted into a writ petition and the Supreme Court passed a directive to this effect.

“As an impassioned advocate of ‘Nothing About Us Without Us’, he has given voice to an ‘invisible minority’— one that has been denied for decades,” said Reeta Gupta, a long-time friend.